Don't Read This Post.

There's just no easy way to navigate a CD called Don't Play Track One during a blitz. As you must know.

And that first track was an absolute killer. In part because I had the CD player turned nice and loud for DMX. When track one hit, I had the presence of mind to wonder if my car had just been hit by a train or a lightning bolt or a tornado. It was quite literally an explosion that rattled the car. And everyone inside.

So it is that: You gotta warn a brother.

At any rate, I just wanted you to be aware that the eponymous track one was a marginally worse experience than the last track of Sgt. Abbey. But only marginally. It was a screwball upset in the 60th minute of an Iron Man match.

DMX Never Played At The Opry

I spoke too soon.

If the transition from Discover Classical Music to the Dixie Chicks was abrupt, then the flip from Shania Twain (last track on Dixie 2 & Other Chicks) to DMX was abrupt blasted with Gamma rays. Really. There's no smooth way maneuver to take you from Top 40 country-pop to hardcore rap.

By the way, it's fun to mention that www.allmusic.com describes DMX as a sort of Hip-Hop Johnny Cash, what with the balancing act between extreme violence and spirituality. All I have to say on the issue is that Johnny Cash always knew where his bitches were at.

Dixie Barbarians.

You wouldn't know to look at it, but I think that the transition between Discover Classical Music (which ends on Carl Orff's pillaging and burning Carmina Burana) to your Dixie Chicks collection has been the most abrupt maneuver so far. Carmina Burana always reminds me of Conan The Barbarian, as that's most clearly the source of Basil Poledouris' film score. Dixie Chicks on the other hand are, well, Nashville's answer to the Bangles.

So it is in one quick step that we arrive at cow-tipping from Conan.

The Brief and The Sweaty

It's too hot in this house to sit in one place for longer than 10 minutes. So you're getting just a quick and dirty update on the D's...

Ladies, Ladies...Ballers, Ballers...

Oh how, oh how did Destiny's Child assume the mantle of super-girl-group of the first years of this century? Because on the basis of The Writing's On The Wall, they weren't due for this kind of success at all. Really, I can't exaggerate how bored and disinterested I was listening to this CD. I was constantly flipping to the traffic updates on CFRB and taking my sweet ass time getting back to the listening. [And if listening to radio commercials trumps the Ol' Blitzeroo experience, we have a problem.]

So I ask. En Vogue. TLC. Destiny's Child. What exactly is the difference? Timing, I suppose.

In fact, knowing that The Writing's On The Wall followed TLC's FanMail by only a few months, it's remarkable to me that this CD got any spotlight at all. It seems to be exactly the same CD. An empty copy of a CD that I never much cared for in the first place.

As you can imagine, I was thrilled to see the EnSalTLC CD show up in the box of upcoming CDs...

Die Rock N' Roll

I had much more fun with Die Springer than I would have thought possible. It wasn't a high point of the Ol' Blitzeroo or anything, but it was a solid, fun, good time. The tunes were excellent and the CD flew by as smooth as anything I've listened to so far. Truth is, I enjoyed the all-German tracks (90% of the album) much more than that one English straggler at the end. This is a great rock band that doesn't need to compromise.

But listening to and loving this CD, it got me to thinking about non-English speaking bands and North American audiences. Clearly, based on what we hear about monstrous European Tours, Japanese Tours and Worldwide Tours, most BIG North American artists have dedicated non-English followings and can sell out stadiums in foreign countries. And from a Western-centric point of view, I would imagine that it's not unusual for the radio in these countries to be flipping and flopping between American music and National music. Does U2 get radio-play in Japan? It would seem so.

So the question is, apart from the neo-Latino movement of a few years ago (and I'm going to include Los Lobos in this group of artists even though they predate Ricky Martin by 2 decades,) does non-English music play in English markets? Can you think of any BIG European groups who didn't compromise and record an English-language version of their biggest hit just to crack Billboard? Anyone who could pump out hits without the liner notes including translated lyrics? (Nena's 99 Luftballons comes to mind, but she did do the English cover of that; between you and me, I've always preferred the original though.) Specifically European and Asian music? Could a group like Die Springer ever find a following on this continent?

[By the way, I know the answer to this question already - but I'm serious about trying to name non-English speaking supergroups... I'll give you a head start: Falco. Now Go!!!]

"Wait, Slow Down...He's Trying To Say Something...?"

Incidentally, I slept late on Friday morning and didn't hit the QEW until a little after 7. It would have been a great morning for the Blitzeroo crossover as I was rounding the end of Digital Additions at the time. The music gods would have really smalled on me for passing your car, rolling down the window, slowing down and playing Put 'Em On The Glass.

I almost called your cellphone to line it up, but I think that might've been cheating...

I was never much of a Def Leppard fan, but...

...let's admit that there's no easy way to sneak around Make Love Like a Man. Call it what you will, but you know that it's a losing debate.

So it is that once I had the image of Joe Elliott in tight ripped shorts and a tight wife-beater belting gay anthems, it was a tough image to shake. The rest of the album became a remarkably frank Mutt Lange-Pride Parade experience. White Lightning indeed.

Spoken in my best Obi-Wan: "Then I'm so sorry."

Jer's Super-Favs Part I.

I should have been keeping track of this from the beginning, I suppose.

Just a heads up when a bestest favorite song - I mean a true desert-island, top-10 sort of number pops up in the Blitzeroo.

Deee-Lite - Try Me On, I'm Very You

With special props for one of my all-time bestest favorite drum fills also.

Miles to Minneapolis

It's pretty clear after listening to Miles Davis' Live Around the World just why he and Prince got on so well in the last few years of his life. They both liked to splash around in the same funk swimming pool.

The bigger mystery then is just who was doing all the borrowing (or let's call it homage?) Both were (and are) regarded as originals and innovators and both were self-proclaimed fans of the other. So with covers of Cyndi Lauper and Michael Jackson showing up in this set, it's clear that Miles was already well aware of Prince by the time this concert was recorded. I wonder how much he was channelling Prince then? Or maybe the question is how much was Prince channelling Miles during the same period and the contemporary live shows that I've heard.

In case you're wondering, I loved the CD. And not for the reason above, but because the vibe/groove that happens throughout the show is really intoxicating. I was on an errand-day on Saturday when I let the CD play through - stopping in Oakville for a haircut, etc. With the summer sun and the leisurely afternoon pace, I was really able to dig into Davis' music and it surprised me a lot. It made me really sleepy in parts and hopped up in others. Which I suppose means that it's working...

Here's a question. (And it's hypothetical. We've already covered your reluctance to talk music in official terms. This is more of an out-there kind of dialogue.) Just what exactly is the difference between Jazz (see: Miles Davis) and simply Jammin' (see: Prince bootlegs.) The reason I ask is that Live Around the World most reminded me of Prince's ultimate boot: Small Club. The latter is a live performance that I cherish and that I am always always able to get absorbed into. Listening to Live Around the World, you could almost convince that they were recorded on the same night. Or at the very least, by the same band. And if Miles is the ultimate jazz artist, what's stopping Prince from occasionally dropping into the Jazz bunk? (Hell, if Harry Connick Jr can be there with She, it's the Wild Wild West.)

Oh, and in the interest of balance, I'd also love to get the answer from a true Jazz snob. I'm sure equating jammin' by a pop artist with true jazz could get a few noses bent out of shape...

At any rate, it occurred to me while listening to Miles Davis that capital-J Jazz is in fact one of only two genres of music that I've never been able to call home. (Reggae is the other, by the way.) I love swing, we've established that. But true jazz - the likes of which you'd read about in books or in a Ken Burns documentary - has always eluded me. Miles Davis. John Coltrane. Charlie Parker. Sonny Rollins. Thelonious Monk. These are a few of the great instrumental jazz players of the 20th Century and they mean almost nothing to me. I've never been able to find my place in this style of music, much as I've tried (and I love most jazz vocalists by the way.) So whether or not I'll ever own a Miles Davis CD, I don't know. If anything, listening to this brief sample has inspired me to dig into his catalogue a tiny bit deeper. But I've been down this road before and I usually lose interest. [Please remind me of this the next time that I tell someone there's no music that I can't enjoy.]

By the way, the transition between Miles and Deee-Lite was one of the most effortless steps yet. The opening trumpet of the Deee-Lite collection might've come right from Miles' concert.

The Home Stretch.

Maybe it's a little early to start calling in the outfielders, but I just finished The Cure and will be starting Miles Davis on Friday when I get back from my Universal trip.

In other words: Welcome to D.

The way I see it - and maybe your Blitz collection is a different animal - but I always start to fly once I've broken through the A-B-C's. From now until M (which is the next seemingly-uncrossable ocean of content), the CDs and artists run quickly into each other.

Stand back.